Wintering
by Natasha68
Summary: Avon is exploring an abandoned rebel hideout on the planet Yar, hoping to find evidence that Blake was there.


WINTERING

1.

"Mind your step now," Michal said. "These stones are slippery. The snow's still melting on this side of the mountain."

He was a middle-aged man from a nearby settlement, and claimed to be a rebel sympathizer; but Avon was wary nevertheless, and from time to time his hand brushed against the handle of the Liberator gun. Michal was leading him up the mountainside and to a nearby cave, where he claimed that a group of rebels had been hiding during winter. "There were about a dozen of them, fifteen at the most," he said. "Scruffy, ragged men. Many of them were wounded. Yes, the off-worlder you're looking for was among them – he had a bandage around his head, maybe over one eye as well. I don't quite remember. I only saw them once or twice. There was a place in the forest where I would leave them some food, though I didn't dare come out too often. There were Federation flyers and ground troops patrolling the area all the time, looking for them."

He was right about the slippery stones, but Avon was still glad to have climbed above the tree line and above mud. He took his guide's advice and looked for some holds in the rockface to maintain balance. For the hundredth time he asked himself why Blake would come to this world and take part in the uprising. Was the man just roaming the galaxy, moving at random from one pathetic anti-Federation revolt to another, or did he have some meaningful agenda? But an investigation had to begin somewhere, Avon thought, and this was the first meaningful clue that he had had since the destruction of Star One.

He knew that in order to find Blake he would have to monitor all kinds of communications; so he had Orac test various frequences, and intercept and decode transmissions from all possible sources. He listened to the Federation movement orders, deployment of troops, invasion plans. He spied on rebel groups and their foolhardy schemes, and listened with a sneer to their lofty phrases on liberty, their simple-minded certainties and idealistic nonsense. He listened to the messages exchanged among smugglers, sharing information about blockade running and the satellites where it was safe to hide contraband. He followed the transmissions that the scientists in secluded space stations relayed to one another; checked on the trade deals struck among neutral worlds; on weapon dealers, slavers, drug cartels, bounty hunters and pirates. He supplied Orac with search terms and algorithms, made it check on coincidences and weave an intricate web of causality out of myriad information, patiently waiting for something to get caught in that web. Finally, something did.

There were records on an off-worlder who came to this planet, named Yar, a few months ago and joined the rebels in this area. He went by the code name Albion, but his real identity was unknown, and the physical description fitted Blake.

Avon didn't bother to learn everything about the war for independence that was raging on Yar; all that seemed relevant was that in this same area, where Blake apparently operated, the rebellion suffered some defeats. Following a large-scale Federation offensive, the rebels were forced to withdraw from two towns which they had previously held; the Federation re-established its rule, and the rebels retreated into the wild to regroup and form guerrilla bands. It appeared that one group had wintered in the cave where Michal was taking Avon; and according to the information Avon had, there was a good chance that Blake had been among them.

They finally reached the entrance of the cave. Avon switched on his torch and stepped inside. At first there was a narrow tunnel, with an uneven floor gradually leading downwards; then the tunnel widened and the two men found themselves in a spacious hall.

It had clearly been used as a hideout. There were some torn clothes, a blackened pot that may have been used for melting snow; and layers of some greyish foliage which served as insulation from the cold stone floor. "Here. See?" Michal said, pointing at a small heap of ash surrounded by a circle of stones, and Avon directed the beam of his torch at it. "This was a fire site. Though it was quite small; I wonder why they didn't build a bigger one?"

"Sensor sweeps," Avon murmured in reply. "They were afraid the Federation devices would detect heat, even through the cave walls."

"It was cold here during the winter," Michal said. "It still is. They must have been freezing."

Avon smiled wryly. "Well now, they had their revolutionary fervour to keep them warm."

The villager gave him a puzzled look, but Avon ignored it. They both continued exploring the cave. Michal searched near the fire site and came upon charred bones of some small animal. "This was a stroke of luck," he commented, showing them to Avon. "It's hard to find any sort of food in these mountains in winter. Perhaps some roots under the snow, if you know the local plants and can tell which ones don't taste bitter. Besides, I guess they didn't dare leave this shelter too often..." He took another look at the small bones and added thoughtfully, "And even on that day when they ate meat, it wasn't much of a meal when shared among fifteen grown men."

_Starving and freezing, then, _Avon thought, but he didn't say anything.

They also found a discarded tissue regenerator, its power cell empty; a bloodied bandage, and a few empty packages of medicaments. "Again, not enough of those pills to heal all of them," Michal said. Avon nodded, reminding himself that several members of that group had been wounded. He could just imagine that idiot, Blake, refusing to take his share of antibiotics and painkillers, insisting that the others' condition was more critical than his and that they should be given priority. _That wound won't heal properly,_ Avon thought. _The next time we meet, he will probably have an ugly scar across his eye_._ Provided he doesn't die of infection first. _

_Provided he isn't already dead._

With that thought, a sudden chill washed over him, and he felt his chest tightening. He suppressed the upsurge of emotions, calling them irrational. It was pointless to conjecture on Blake's condition, he told himself, when he didn't even know for certain that the man had been in this cave. And worrying was counterproductive in any case. It only wasted valuable energy which should be used instead to analyse the existing data and draw conclusions...

The bandage, however, struck him as something that might be important. He picked it up and gripped it in his hand. He would bring it on board the Liberator and analyse it. The blood on it could be anyone's. But there was a chance, however slim, that it was Blake's. And if it was – then he would finally have a firm proof, something tangible telling him of Blake's movements.

At that moment, he felt a sharp pain in the back of his head and everything went black.

2.

Cally sat close to the medical couch where Avon was sleeping, watching him as he shifted and moaned quietly from time to time. There was a bloodied bandage in his right hand that he held tightly even in his sleep. His head injury was almost healed; she treated it as soon as she brought him back on board, and a diagnostic analysis confirmed that he would make a full recovery. But it wasn't Avon's health that Cally was worried about as she watched him slowly coming to – it was his emotional reaction.

She saw him opening his eyes and sent a telepathic message, knowing it would reach his semiconscious mind more easily than her physical voice. _Avon, you're in the Liberator's medical bay. You've suffered a head injury, but you'll be all right. Gently as you wake up; don't make any sudden moves._

Avon blinked, nodded, and slowly propped himself up on one elbow. "What happened?"

"I found you in that cave you were exploring," Cally said, using her normal voice this time. "It appears there was some seismic activity in the area; a portion of the ceiling collapsed and you were hit in the head. It seems that, when that happened, your teleport bracelet was also crushed."

Avon sat up gingerly. His gaze fell on the bandage in his hand. He kept staring at it and Cally wondered whether he was listening at all to what she was saying.

"I didn't even know your exact location," she said. "I only had the coordinates where I had put you down, and your vague mention of some nearby cave you were going to investigate. When I lost contact with you, I decided to teleport to the same coordinates and search the area. Avon – I was lucky to find you."

"What about that local – Michal?" Avon asked. "Was he not in there with me?"

Cally shook her head. "There was no one else. You were alone when I found you."

"That's strange," Avon murmured, but he didn't pursue the matter further. "Thank you. For saving me," he added quietly. "Are we still above Yar?"

"I'm afraid not. A Federation squadron detected us on their close-range sensors. Tarrant had to leave orbit and fly the ship to safety."

"I see." Avon rubbed his eyes. "Well, we'll have to go back there as soon as possible. I need to find more clues… As you have seen yourself, that cave was a hiding place. A group of idealists lived in it, in charming conditions. There are indications that Blake was among them. I believe he was wounded. He may still be –"

He stopped talking, noticing the bewildered, almost frightened look on Cally's face.

"What on earth are you talking about, Avon?" she asked. "There was nothing in that cave."

"What do you mean, there was nothing? You must have seen it. Ash from a campfire. Discarded equipment. Improvised beds. It was clearly a hideout."

Cally stared at him with confusion and concern, not knowing how to respond to the intensity in his eyes. Slowly, Avon's expression softened and he lowered his eyes. "You... were worried about me," he offered an explanation. "You were in a hurry to get me back to the Liberator. You didn't look around carefully."

"It's not that, Avon." Cally's voice was kind, but resolute. "I remember the cave's interior quite clearly. There was nothing inside. It was empty."

"Rubbish!" he snapped. "I know what I saw!"

He jumped from the couch and gripped her arm. He shook her furiously, and beneath his anger, Cally sensed confusion and painful doubts. Although she couldn't read his mind, she thought she could hear his unspoken questions: _Are you lying to me? Are you trying to trick me? Have you betrayed me?_

_Avon_, she sent telepathically, trying to calm him down. _You've had a concussion. Perhaps..._

He let go of her arm and stepped away from her. He raised his hand and showed her the bandage, shaking it in front of her face. "I don't understand what is going on here," he said. "But here's evidence. Here is something you can't deny. I've found this in the cave. Let us analyse the blood on this bandage."

"Perhaps... later," Cally hesitated. "Avon, you need a bit more time to recover. Don't rush."

"Right now!" he snarled.

He strode to the laboratory, ignoring his injury and almost running as anger and agitation caused his adrenaline to soar. He cut off a piece of bandage and placed it in the analyzer unit. While the machine did its work, he stood motionless, his lips pressed together, his fists clenched so hard that his knuckles turned white.

"Analysis complete," the medical computer announced dispassionately. "The DNA identity profile corresponds to the available data in medical records. The blood sample belongs to Kerr Avon."

For a few seconds, Avon stood completely still. Suddenly he seemed to Cally very weak and very tired, the effects of his injury finally catching up with him. She touched his arm. "I wanted to tell you, but you didn't give me time," she said. "When I found you, that bandage was wrapped around your head. Avon, you were lying in that cave for several hours. At some point during that period, you must have briefly regained consciousness, realized that your head had been cut, and improvised this bandage to stop the bleeding. Then you probably passed out again, and forgot all about it. Don't you see? You've made it from your own shirt." Avon looked down at the front of his shirt and noticed, for the first time, that a large part of it had been torn off; and the bandage, he now realized, was made of the same fabric.

He sank to his knees. Cally quickly knelt next to him, grabbing him by the arm and shoulder, offering support. Blindly, Avon's hand seemed to grope for something to hold on to, and finally caught the front of Cally's blouse. "No. No." He closed his eyes, desperately trying to focus. "There was another man with me, I tell you, a local villager. He confirmed it was the rebels' hideout. He had seen that group of rebels, said that there was an off-worlder among them... Cally, the description fitted Blake."

"There was no one with you, Avon." Cally said. "The villager was also a part of hallucination. The head trauma must have caused it all. The villager, the fire site, everything you think you saw in there... None of it was real."

Cally's telepathic voice in his head was gentle, but the words were far from comforting.

_Blake was never in that cave, Avon. He was never there._

3.

Avalon's message came about a month before Avon's visit to Yar. Cally recognized the thirty-year old, destandardized code that Avalon had always used to contact the Liberator, as it passed undetected by the Federation's automatic monitoring. In Blake's time, Cally had had a duty to maintain contact with the Liberator's allies – Avalon, Sarkoff, Ro, Del Grant, Cauder, Veron. After the Intergalactic War, she continued to check regularly for their messages; it was her way of contributing to Avon's efforts to find Blake.

When she decoded the message, it told her that Avalon was currently staying on Alcor III, a neutral world, and there was information about a frequency she could use to contact her. She established a visual link and Avalon's image appeared on the communications panel. She looked haggard, and older than Cally remembered; but when their eyes met, a smile lit up Avalon's face and erased some of the weariness that had been etched on it.

"Cally – it's good to see you. I was hoping you would recognize the encryption and contact me personally. Blake wanted me to deliver his message directly to you."

"Blake…!" Cally's heart leapt. She could hardly contain her excitement. "Where is he? Is he well? Can he contact us personally? Is Jenna with him…?"

Avalon held up her hand in a vague gesture that suggested she didn't know the answer to any of those questions. "All I have is a short message that I received from him, with the instruction to pass it on to you. He has joined the rebel forces on Yar. He wants you to keep it a secret. You are not to follow him or try to find him there. He also mentions Avon in particular; he says that if Avon, by any chance, suspects that he is on Yar, you mustn't tell him anything – just put him off the trail."

Cally listened in disbelief, trying to make sense of the strange message.

"And before you ask – " Avalon added quickly, "I'm just as puzzled by this as you are. I know nothing about Blake's plans. He hasn't coordinated his activities with mine nor, to my knowledge, with those of any other resistance leader. The planet is not strategically important. It's just a sparsely populated agricultural world, far from the trade routes and major Federation military bases. We are not planning any large-scale operations there. At the moment, there are armed insurgencies on at least a dozen of other frontier worlds; I can think of no obvious reason why Blake has chosen to go to Yar."

"It is all so strange," Cally said. "Why not let Avon in on it?" She would have understood if Blake had heard about the Liberator's new crew members, and if he had wanted to hide his location from them. He didn't know them and didn't know if they could be trusted. But why Avon? Cally couldn't think of anything that Blake would share with her and not with Avon.

Avalon shrugged. "I don't know Avon well enough to answer that question," she said. "But based on the time I spent with you aboard the Liberator, I do know that he is not committed to the rebellion in the way that you and Blake are. He has his own agenda, his own priorities. I'm certain that Blake has some good reason for keeping things from him… even if he can't explain it right now."

Cally fell silent, thinking about Avalon's words. In fact, she thought, it wasn't unusual for Blake to make decisions on his own, without consulting anyone; to withhold information; to give orders first and explanations later. But asking her to lie to Avon, to put him off the trail – that _was_ unusual, even by Blake's standards. She felt that something was deeply wrong.

"What do you know about the uprising on Yar?" she asked, hoping for anything that would shed light on Blake's actions.

"I do know that it's massive," Avalon said. "I was fascinated by how quickly it spread throughout the continent, and by its great popular support. I don't think I've ever seen a people fighting so fiercely to overthrow the Federation. Still, it's understandable, since they are fighting for their very survival."

"What do you mean?"

"Yar used to be a major producer of grain and other kinds of food plants in the eleventh sector. Being a Federation colony, though, they've been forced to export the greatest part of their produce to the Inner Worlds. The merciless Federation trade laws meant that, like all the other colonies, they were always on the edge of poverty… But their real troubles started when the artificial climate control failed. The climate on their planet used to be controlled by the central computer system on Star One; and when Star One was destroyed during the Intergalactic War, the climate on Yar became extremely unstable. For the last six months, they have had almost perpetual winter, with large amounts of snow and temperatures below freezing. During a few brief intervals, the weather got warmer and enormous piles of snow melted, causing devastating floods in the lower regions; then temperatures dropped again, bringing more snowfall. For an agricultural world this is a disaster. The Yarrans won't be able to grow anything at all this year."

"But the Federation colonial administrators will not care," Cally realized. "At an appointed time, they will demand of the inhabitants to deliver the exact same quotas as before, won't they?"

"The Federation only cares that the privileged Inner Worlds remain well supplied," Avalon said bitterly. "They will take whatever they can from the colonials – pillage their stocks and granaries, causing famine throughout the continent. If the Yarrans are forced to export, hundreds of thousands may die of starvation."

"So their only chance is to overthrow the Federation rule and keep the food for themselves?" Cally asked.

"Yes – if they succeed, they might just have enough to survive. But their chances for winning this war are very slim. The climate is still unstable, the rebels are fighting in extremely harsh weather conditions, and the Federation keeps bringing in reinforcements."

"I think I understand now why Blake is on Yar," Cally said quietly. "He considers it a hell of his own making."

Cally wasn't sure if she could explain it to Avalon. What she sensed was that Blake was on Yar because he felt guilty, that he regarded the plight of Yarrans as his own crime. The consequences of destroying Central Control on Star One were becoming visible everywhere after the Intergalactic War: ceaseless rains on Epheron; Cassiona turned into a scorched desert; anti-radiation shields on Parides no longer functioning; Suni, Vilka, Palmero… and this endless winter on Yar. Cally was certain that Blake realized his mistake when he was faced with all this suffering. It was true that the Andromedans had destroyed Star One; but he had planned to do it, and the consequences would have been exactly the same. At least on Yar there was something he could do about it – join the rebellion, offer the locals his knowledge of strategy and guerrilla warfare. Starving, wintering, fighting by their side for as long as it was necessary, until they won their war for independence. Or until the Federation forces wiped them all out, Cally thought, the way they had done with her comrades on Saurian Major…

She also understood why Blake didn't want Avon to know anything about it. "Avon has his own priorities," Avalon had said, without fully realizing what it meant. If Avon found out that Blake was on Yar, his priority would be to save Blake's life. He would have no understanding for the man's motives nor for his guilt, which he would consider utterly irrational. The only rational thing, for Avon, would be to pull Blake out of his impossible mission, to get him to safety before he got himself killed in a desperate war.

And Cally wanted that badly, too – to bring Blake home, on board the Liberator. But she also understood why he needed to be on Yar. And she didn't want to betray his trust.

She looked at Avalon's face on the comms panel: it appeared almost frozen as the interference lines passed across it. The young rebel leader was waiting for her reply.

"I will do as he says."

A month later, when Avon teleported to the surface of Yar, Cally teleported almost immediately after him with the help of Orac. She followed him and the villager from a safe distance as they were climbing up the mountainside, and sneaked into the cave unseen by them. Then she waited for an opportunity to fire a stun blast at the back of Avon's head; she needed to do that so she could later convince him that there had been a quake and that he had been hit by a rock from the cave's ceiling. After this, dealing with the terrified villager was simple. She pointed the gun at him and ordered him to run. Then she set charges and teleported back to the ship with the unconscious Avon before the cave exploded.

The rest of the Liberator crew – Vila, Dayna and Tarrant – weren't involved in her plan. She had told them the same lie that she had told Avon.

"I don't know if he is suspecting anything," she said, recording a report for Avalon. "It's difficult to say. He is still suffering from concussion, and he's disoriented and confused… But this is Avon we're talking about. Once he recovers he will start asking questions again. I will have to be careful about every little detail, every answer I give him. He will be looking for inconsistencies, for anything that fails to conform to logic. He will check and re-check every fact. Avon doesn't trust easily," she added, sadly. "And this ruse has only worked because… until now… he has trusted me completely."

She ended the recording, realizing that her voice had become shaky and hardly audible. She had lied to Avon; regardless of all the reasons she could name to justify it, she knew that, in her heart, it would never feel right.

After she had sent the report to Avalon, she instructed Zen to erase it from its memory banks. She also deleted all data about the transmission and the code patterns she had used. There was only one thing left to do: destroy the bandage. Not the one that she tucked into Avon's hand when she brought him back to the Liberator, but the original one – the one Avon had found in the rebel hideout in that cave on Yar.

All she had to do was throw it down the incinerator; but she couldn't bring herself to do it, not yet. She went back to the medical laboratory and placed the fabric in the analyzer unit. When the analysis was complete, she asked for identification. The medical computer did not recognize the DNA profile. It wasn't Blake's blood; it belonged to some unidentified person on Yar.

It was the blood of one of Blake's comrades, Cally thought. She didn't quite understand why her eyes filled with tears. Blake would have told her that it made no difference.

9


End file.
